This Is My Brain on Paper Towels

My little green guilts.

By

April 22, 2014

I’ve been using paper towels a lot—a lot—more often lately, and every time I do, I feel a spark of guilt. It’s wasteful, bad for the environment, I know, but I’ve been sick lately, so I need it. I figure that paper is more sanitary than the cloth towel that’s been sitting out for days. (I can understand the woman with sick kids who said on the radio, “Thank god for paper towels.”)

But I’ve also been destroying groves of trees for reasons that have nothing to do with health or hygiene. Paper towels are easier; there’s a slight satisfaction when the perforated seam rips just right, and when I tear off a piece, I’m participating a little bit more in America and its corporate pleasures. To ignore your worries about waste is itself a kind of pleasure, and for a moment, I imagine that Sarah Palin isn’t scorning me as a wimp mom-pants green do-gooder. That bright white, clean slate of a paper towel momentarily wipes my politics clean enough to join the ranks of both corporate and red America.

My guilt and good sense usually win out over such ridiculous pulp fictions. I recycle and, in the summer, I compost. I try my best to boycott the long list of Koch-ownedhousehold products, like Stainmaster carpet and Lycra, that have invaded the world. (So no Brawny paper towels or other Georgia-Pacific products in my house.) I bring my own shopping bags.

But… I eagerly stock up on plastic shopping bags, for the kitty litter. I get a lot of take-out and, not always bothering to track what’s recyclable and what’s not, I throw out tons of plastic containers and unused knife and fork sets. Water? I often forget and let it run and run.

And I rationalize: I’ve never been a purist, I tell myself. We’re all a little corrupt. As long as I’m pointed in the right direction, that’s good enough. Excuses and small daily denialisms course through our minds as much as fire retardants, pesticides, BPA, phthalates and PFOAs (the magic ingredient in Teflon) course through our bodies.

Corporations depend on our rationalizations: it absolves them of doing anything wrong and it creates guilt-free consumers. That’s why they run all the ads that tell us, “What, you worry?” Falling back on wasteful or toxic products not only has its perverse pleasures, but it can seem “natural,” especially if those products are featured in ads with wild animals and awe-inspiring landscapes.